He nods once, his jaw slightly set, as though he's filing the information away and already planning to check again in twenty minutes.
Nobody moves with any urgency. Elias disappears into the bathroom. Bash finds his shirt tangled somewhere in the blankets, pulls it over his head, and then just sits there on the edge of the nest like he’s forgotten what comes next. Adrian is the same — upright, elbows on his knees, staring at nothing. The fact that today is the last day of filming and all three of them are needed on set sits over the room.
It's Adrian who breaks the silence first, his gaze fixed on the floor, his hands clasped loosely. “Do you want one of us to stay home today?”
I shoot him a questioning look.
“I mean it,” he says. “If you’d rather have someone here, that’s more important than the last day of a shoot. We can figure out the logistics.” He finally looks at me. “The shoot will manage.”
“I can call out,” Bash says casually from his side of the bed. Like him doing so wouldn’t throw the entire production off track.
I look from Bash to the bathroom doorway. Elias is standing there listening to the conversation. He meets my gaze directly. He doesn't offer to stay, but he doesn't need to. I know he would if I asked.
None of them have made me feel like a burden.
They mean it.
All three of them are sitting here genuinely willing to miss the last day of a major production to stay home with me, and not one of them seems to view that as a sacrifice.
I sit with that for a moment.
Then I make a decision.
“I want to be alone today.”
The room goes silent.
“Not because anything is wrong,” I say before their expressions can shift too far. “I just want to move through the house by myself for a little while. Without anyone watching.” I glance down at my hands. “I've been nesting for two days while all of you watch me do it. I want to do it without an audience.”
Bash's mouth curves into something that almost qualifies as a smile. “The chair repositioning in the kitchen yesterday.”
“That was functional,” I say.
“You moved it six inches.”
“The light was wrong.” I meet his eyes, and a smile spreads across his expression.
“I want the house to feel right,” I say. “I need to focus without feeling like I'm being studied.”
Adrian is already nodding. He doesn't like it. I can see that in the tension still lingering in his jaw. But he's nodding anyway. “Okay,” he says.
Elias nods once.
“We'll have our phones,” Adrian says. “All three of us. If you text, one of us will come back immediately.”
“I know,” I say softly.
“The blocker supply in the bathroom is—”
“Adrian.” I cut him off before he can finish.
He stops.
“I know where everything is,” I say. “You showed me three times.”
A rueful expression crosses his face. He presses his mouth together, glances briefly at the floor, and then looks back up.
“Right,” he says. “Okay.”
